1. Field of the Invention (Technical Field)
The present invention relates to automatic visual classification of objects.
2. Background Art
Automatic Target Recognition (“ATR”) has been an area of work for little less than a half a century. While no universal solution has arisen to date, which is to be expected, what has been accomplished in that time frame is a wealth of approaches which have had varying degrees of success in addressing constrained problem sets. These techniques count on the extraction of imagery information along with a priori knowledge of the particular problem scenario. By restricting the problem set one can make systems that have proven to be useful for automatic unaided operation.
FIG. 1 shows some of the analysis tools that give an ATR the capability of drawing a conclusion about the object under observation. The ATR paradigm can be model driven and this requires a matching strategy and reference model database to act as exemplars to be matched against. Or, it can use a statistical approach based on feature analysis, with the proper restrictions, to draw useful conclusions. In the last few decades an applique of higher-level reasoning has proven to improve the overall ATR's performance.
Approaches for image-based ATR systems vary widely, however, their common goal is to extract information in order to identify objects of interest. Many approaches are based on image phenomenology principles that reflect the basis of human reasoning. Simplicity has also been a quality of many of the techniques that have been implemented in real-time systems. These fundamentals form the foundation of the present invention, referred to as the Visual Profile Classifier (“VPC”). The VPC quantifies visual cues that allow people to categorize various groups of similar object types independent from view angles and other conditions. The VPC technique of the invention can be applied differently depending on specific ATR requirements. It can range from silhouette and size analysis to complete principle component representation.